As tourist attractions go St. Thomas is right up there…with most islands. What about non-island places?

Let’s take Spain. Barcelona has an aquarium, a popular tourist spot for children and families located in the port area near many Las Ramblas hoteles. St. Thomas has Coral World, a place for people to go and check out marine life both above and in the gorgeous Caribbean water. Coral World is located on the East End of the island.

The Spanish Village near many Barcelona hoteles is also a draw; it’s an area replicating the style and architecture from different parts of Spain.

It includes shops showcasing traditional Spanish wares. St. Thomas has Charlotte Amalie, well-know for its fantastic shopping – both traditional and modern. Look away from the stores for a moment and you’ll notice buildings that have been standing for many, many years – a great photo opportunity.

Madrid is home to a 3,000 room Royal Palace, most like way nicer than any Madrid hoteles you might find…

The Spanish royals don’t live there so it’s open to visitors and tourists looking to take a peek. St. Thomas has nothing royal, unless you count the Royal Caribbean cruise ships that frequent our popular port! Point goes to Madrid for that one.

Clearly there isn’t a lot of science involved in this comparison, so I’m going to draw the line here. In the sand. At Magens Bay Beach – which you’ll only find in St. Thomas

Let the games begin! Last year we introduced our Best of St. Thomas Awards and they were a smash hit. This year we’re changing the categories a bit. So let’s start it up, category 1:

Best “Finger Lickin’ Food “- What’s your favorite restaurant/grill for hands on food? Think; burgers, ribs, chicken wings, you get the point. Stuff you need extra napkins for and maybe a wet-nap.

Please comment and announce your favorite. These votes count, so get your friends, associates who ever to vote. Help us spread the good word.

Nicci and I would just like to give thanks to all of you. We’re so lucky to live on the beautiful island of St. Thomas. Enjoy your time today with friends and family.

Scott & Nicci

Saturday, December 6^th from 7 p.m.-2 a.m.

at Marriott’s Frenchman’s Reef.

Come ready to play Texas Hold’em Poker, Craps, Blackjack, Roulette and so much more…There will be live music, tasty food and amazing drinks.

Come ready to win a $10, 000 cash raffle, a 2009 Toyota Camry Hybrid and even more cash prizes.

You can also take part in our silent & live auction where you can bid for a get-a-way vacation to New York or New Orleans, his & her Rolex watches, an original painting by D.W. Thompson and the list of fantastic items just keeps going.

Tickets are $90 in advance and $100 at the door.  All entrance tickets include a $20  value of food & beverage tickets. 

Get your Las Vegas Ticket at these local outlets: Red Hook Secretarial Service-Red Hook Plaza, Glenn’s Gifts and Bags, Phil’s Paradise, Lattes in Paradise, American Yacht Harbor, Modern Music and VI Montessori School. Free Shuttle from Havensight Mall to Frenchman’s Reef only.

Remember Las Vegas Night, December 6^th.

The only place you’ll want to roll!

When Nicci and I bought our villa we heard the stories. St. Thomas loses power… a lot. I need to be connected always as my business is virtual. So we bought a 40 kilowatt generator. It’s enough to run our villa full steam for about 7 days straight.

In the 3 years we’ve lived in paradise we’ve lost power a lot. But not for long, a few hours at most. Until yesterday. The entire island of St. Thomas and St. John have been without power for over 24 hours. And it doesn’t look good. A lot of turkeys went bad in the last 24 hours. Restaurants are closed. People aren’t working.

The important thing is the generator is keeping our beer cold – for us…the neighbors…and whoever else could use one as we move to Day Two.

The waves crashing outside our window are full of power.

The lights at our neighbors house? Not so much. Actually, they’re out. 

WAPA, the island’s electricity company, lost power this morning when a fire erupted. I’ll save you the technical story, but let’s just say St. Thomas and St. John have been without power for most of the day. This story in the Source says that three feeders have been restored; I went to school for Psychology, so I don’t know anything about power, but it seems to me that restored feeders are a good thing.

I figure there are two ways to look at a day without power – AAHH! or ‘dems da breaks. Let’s look at some examples:

If you were planning to take advantage of the one-ship, light traffic day that was today by running errands downtown only to be hindered by businesses without generators – AAHH! Especially when you know tomorrow is a four (if not more) ship day and traffic downtown will be, um, ridiculous.

If you’re a student who was dreading a full day at school only to be let out at 11am (as they were today), ‘dems da breaks. Well, for students getting out of class I think YES!!!!!!!!!! is more suitable…

…same goes for those of you who work for a business that has no generator; today was a short day for you, hope you did something fun with your extra time. ‘dems da breaks ya know.

If you’re a surfer who was out enjoying the waves you probably have no clue that there was an island-wide power outage. Don’t sweat it, dude.

If you’re already stressed with Thanksgiving planning and the power outage today was One More Thing That You Had To Deal With…NO!

…same goes for those of you who can’t live without your afternoon viewing of Judge Judy. What? I’ll miss her shouting at some teenager?! NO! I’ll reserve comment on your choice of programming, but feel free to pick up a book sometime…

If you were out on a boat today fishing or island-hopping, then today’s power outage was not a big deal for you…so ‘dems da breaks, and hope you caught a big one!

…same goes for all of you who decided to deal with this loss of power by beaching it for the day. ‘dems da breaks, and where’s my colada?

And finally, for those of you who work for WAPA, I’m sure you yelled, “NO!!” and followed that up with something like, “The island hates us already!!!!!”

Scott and I have been home for most of the day, and thankfully we do have a generator, although the power outage would not have really affected us. We’re thinking of heading out to hunt down a working restaurant and grab some chow.

‘dems da breaks!

St. Thomas Blog Wins Top Honors in Business Competition under Most Slacker Friendly Category

St. Thomas, USVI – 11-24-08 – St. Thomas Blog has been recognized by StartupNation as one of the top businesses in its annual Home Based 100 competition under the category of Most Slacker Friendly. 

Many of the StartupNation Home-Based 100 submissions revealed that business owners are bucking the current economic downturn and finding business success in these tight times. Historically some of today’s most well known businesses started in a downturn, including Microsoft and General Electric.

“The 2008 ranking shows that the home-based business is more relevant than ever. The current recession has spurred a new wave of home based businesses as a response to loss of jobs, the need for supplemental income and the sheer passion for blazing your own trail and running your own show,” said Rich Sloan, co-founder of StartupNation.com, one of the leading small business networking and advice websites. “Home based businesses are the biggest block of all businesses in existence and we expect numbers to grow ever greater as extra bedrooms, kitchen tables, basements and garages become host to the innovative thinking and pursuit of success by millions of Americans.”

Nicci White, of St. Thomas Blog, says “Being able to run a business from home is a dream come true. We help locals and tourists who live on or travel to the beautiful island of St. Thomas.”

The StartupNation Home-Based 100 highlights 10 top-ten lists making it not just your ordinary business ranking. From the wackiest, to the most innovative, to the best financial performers – this unique and diverse list highlights the home-based businesses that usually go unrecognized, but still play a vital role in the economy today. The ten categories for 2008 include:

·        Best Financial Performers

·        Most Innovative

·        Boomers Back in Business

·        Greenest

·        Yummiest

·        Wackiest

·        Grungiest

·        Recession Busters

·        Most Slacker-Friendly

·        Most Glamorous

In addition to StartupNation staff, judges for this year’s Home Based 100 ranking included Adam Lowry, co-founder of Method Products, Howard Behar, former President of Starbucks North America, John Jantsch, founder of Duct Tape Marketing, Mel Robbins, host of Make It Happen radio show.

The full results of the Home-Based 100 ranking are available on StartupNation’s website:

http://www.startupnation.com/homebased100.

After a few days of pretty calm ocean we woke up to the sound of crashing waves.

Not big booming ones like the below wave that I photographed last year, but we’re getting there!

College basketball soon come…as soon as Friday. If you’re on St. Thomas and a fan of college ball then you should plan on making your way to the University of the V.I. (seating: 4,000) this weekend for some serious competition.

(all photos from Paradise Jam.com)

Paradise Jam is in it’s 9th year and this is expected to be one of the best in it’s history. Here is a quick description of this competition:

The U.S. Virgin Islands Paradise Jam offers men’s and women’s college basketball teams a chance for excellent early season competition in an exotic island setting. Since the tournament’s inception in 2000, many of the nation’s finest men and women’s teams have converged on St. Thomas to test their skills and enjoy some fun in the sun

The men’s competition begins on 11/21 with the following teams (all Division I): Connecticut, Iona, La Salle, Wisconsin, Miami, San Diego, Southern Miss, Valparaiso. The women start playing on 11/27: California, Central Florida, Baylor, Iowa, South Florida, Wisconsin, Texas Tech, Villanova.

The big news this year is the exposure this tournament will have on national television. You can catch the 11/23 games on FOX College Sports and regional FOX stations will broadcast the UCONN games. FOX will carry the finals on 11/24. You can read more about the television coverage here.

Men’s schedule: 11/21, 2pm Miami v Southern Miss, 4:30pm Valparaiso v San Diego, 7pm UCONN v La Salle, 9:30pm Wisconsin v Iona. You can find the entire schedule here.

Women’s schedule: 11/27, 2pm Wisconsin v Villanova, 4:30pm Baylor v Central Florida, 7pm Iowa v Texas Tech, 9:30pm California v South Florida. You can find the remaining schedule here.

*All times are island local time, the Virgin Islands are one hour ahead of Eastern Standard Time (no Daylight Savings time down here)*

Here is the history on past winners: Men  Women

If you’re wondering if Scott and I are rooting for anyone in particular the answer is no, but my parents are big UCONN fans, so I will be tracking their progress

Good luck to all the teams!

It’s not dramatic as that title might suggest though!

Scott and I went to Magens Bay yesterday, our Sunday ritual. As we were all on the beach hanging out Scott suddenly saw a fin appear by the buoy line (which designates the swim area) and he yelled Shark! Well, he’s from Boston, so it sounded more like Shahk!

We snapped our heads towards the water but it was gone as quickly as it appeared. Sharks would not be an uncommon sight at Magens, but usually they are way out from the swim area, so this was a bit odd. Odd enough that people claimed it was really a dolphin. A couple of friends went in for a swim and when they came out they confirmed it was a shark, a baby one, maybe 3 or 4 feet in length and probably of the reef or nurse species.

Throughout the day we kept having sightings of it splashing along the buoy line; it certainly didn’t keep people out of the water as it was so small. At one point we thought there might have been two of them. I went in for my dip that afternoon and stayed about waist/chest high in the water, although that’s not uncommon for me – I’m paranoid about deep water and never go to the buoy line as it is. Yesterday I kept an eye peeled for any sort of dark shape swimming near me, but this little baby shark (or sharks) stayed where he was, occasionally splashing out of the water far away from us.

But, that doesn’t change the fact that yesterday I swam with sharks

Nicci and I had a great time last night at the Buzz 104.3′s party at Hooters benefiting Toys For Tots. The 80′s band “Kamma Project” from Puerto Rico was very good even though they played songs from the 60′s-70′s like “Wild Thing” and “I Wanna Rock and Roll All Night and Party Everyday”.

What I really liked about the band was their heavy latin accents.  When they broke out Journey’s “Anyway Jew Want It”, I had to do a double take. I thought to myself, why are they throwing religion into this song and then it hit me….the accent! In all seriousness they were really great and it was for a good cause.

As soon as Cristina (morning host on the Buzz) posts her pictures I’ll add them into the blog. Big thanks to the Buzz 104.3 for putting on the show.

Jew guys rock!

As islands go St. Thomas has some of the best roads you’ll find – most are paved, wide and easy to navigate.

We also have our fair share of roads where it’s 4×4 vehicle or bust. These roads might have been paved once but have now deteriorated down to chunks of cement with mostly dirt and gravel surrounded by potholes and other obstacles. These non-roads are usually steep and full of turns that could be the right way, someone’s driveway or a dead end. Turns will sometimes resemble a u-turn and you will begin a game of forward/reverse until the turn is completed. These roads are often only one lane wide and at some point you will face a car coming the other way and it’s up to the two of you to decide who will back up and who will pass depending on the current location.

It’s these tyes of roads that usually lead to some sort of necessary car repair. There are places on the island to get your vehicle fixed, but it’s still hard to know the car repair estimate, depending on the damage. Few things are more frustrating than your car breaking down.

These bumpy roads are also the reason to make sure you’re comfortable with your rental during your visit. Here are a few things to check for when renting a vehicle on our island (and any other island with big hills and rough roads).

1) Make sure you know if a 4 wheel drive is required for your destination. Our hotels and resorts are located off of paved roads, but private villas are usually located at the end of rough terrain. Most owners will post this information on their website, but it’s a good idea to check with the owner. Our house is located at the bottom of a tricky road, and we rented a car for one day. It was a rainy day and as I slowly navigated up the hill the tires would spin occasionally when it hit an area that was paved and slick. I really didn’t think I would make it up. Our SUV has never had an issue. Don’t ask me why we rented a car…

2) St. Thomas is full of hills, and if you’re not accelerating up one you’re braking on the way down. During our first visit here we rented a Jeep. An hour later as we were making our way down one of the steepest roads I’d ever seen Scott said, “Our brakes are not good”. That’s pretty much the last thing I wanted to hear at that moment. We went back to the rental place and switched Jeeps after making sure the next one had good brakes. Don’t get stuck with shady brakes.

3) Back to that rental car we had for one day. As I headed down our road I hit a couple of areas where I felt something on the bottom of the car scrape. Great. When I parked in front of our house I checked underneath and saw one bit of the car being held up by rope that was tied to the front fender. Really?! I packed the car with the stuff I was moving and headed back up the hill very slowly, scraping here and there. We returned it and pointed it out to the auto repair shop at the rental place. This is not typical of the cars being rented down here, but it might be a good idea to take a peek underneath; the previous driver may have bottomed out somewhere and who knows what might be hanging on by a rope!

Oh, and when driving down here, always remember (say it with me) Drive On The Left

Nicci and I will be heading over to Hooters Saturday night the 15th for a rockin 80′s party. I’m told there will be an actual 80′s band called Kamma Project so I’ll be whippin it, whippin it good. And it’s all for a great cause – Toys For Tots, so bring some toys!

Please come by and say hi, I drink dark & diet, don’t come empty handed

(Um, this is the Kahuna’s wife, who he neglected to mention will also be there, ‘whippin it’. I’ll take a Presidente…!)

After a visit in MA to see friends and family Scott and I are happily back on St. Thomas. Woo!

We arrived Tuesday afternoon after a very long day of flying; American doesn’t allow birds in the cabin so we are denied a direct flight and had to choose Delta’s Boston-Atlanta, Atlanta-St. Thomas. About an hour out of Atlanta a passenger took ill with chest pains, and 40 minutes later they diverted us to the Bahamas so she could be taken off the plane and receive better care than what the cabin of an airplane could offer. Lucky for her there was a cardiologist onboard, as well as roughly 12 other doctors and nurses who stood up to help so she was in good hands.

If you’re not cruising down here then you’re flying, and Scott and I have to say that Delta made an excellent impression on us! They handled that situation as best they could, their flight attendants were friendly and helpful and the captain came over the intercom many times to keep us all informed, albeit with a thick Australian accent that took some getting used to.

One flight attendant in particular had a great sense of humor and kept us laughing during the flight. She knew the majority of the passengers were coming to St. Thomas for vacation and she cracked a couple of jokes about how at least the peanuts and cookies were free for those who spent all their money on their all-inclusive stays. After the passenger had been taken off of the plane in the Bahamas she got on the intercom with this message, “Ladies and Gentlemen we have a request, we are about ready to resume travel but we need to know if anyone has access to a credit card as we need to buy some gas…”.

While we were on the tarmac in Nassau the flight attendants asked for a show of hands of people who were traveling on to Tortola once they reached St. Thomas – after a good number of people raised their hands they told us they were in touch with the ferry and were asking for them to wait for the plane to arrive so the Tortola-bound passengers wouldn’t get stuck. A little bit later our favorite attendant got back on the horn to inform us that “due to someone on the plane who was able to throw their weight around the ferry to Tortola will wait for us to land and those of you continuing on will have a shuttle waiting at the airport to whisk you to the ferry.” How helpful!

As we took of from the Bahamas she came back on with this message, “We’d like to thank you all for your cooperation in this situation, the captain would like to buy everyone a glass of white or red wine…” (applause) “…we do have cocktails on board as well but unfortunately we would still have to charge you for those as there aren’t that many left and the people who will be boarding this plane in St. Thomas to go to Atlanta probably want something to drink along the way…”

We arrived in St. Thomas a couple of hours late, and after we landed (and all of us applauded) the attendant got on the intercom with this message, “Please make sure to check around and gather up all of your belongings. If you leave anything behind you can find it on Ebay under my account…” (laughter) “…we’d like to acknowledge the people that helped our sick passenger and made her comfortable…” (applause) “…and we’d also like to thank the service men and women who are traveling with us today for all you do for your country…” (applause) “…and finally, welcome to the island! Remember, what happens in St. Thomas stays in St. Thomas!” (applause and laughter)

Thank you Delta, it was a long day but you handled a rough situation the best way you could and kept us informed with good humor!

By Cecily Mercer

On Oct. 28, I was driving past the top of Blackpoint Hill around 5 a.m. when I was shocked by the sight of a man lying on the side of the road. Since it was dark and deserted, I decided that the safest thing to do was to call for help once I got to the bottom of the hill as there is no cell phone service in the area. When I got to Brewer’s beach, I called 911. To my dismay, there was no answer. I tried again two more times (including letting the phone ring 12 times on the other end of the third call), and my calls were still unanswered.

Read the rest of the disturbing story here.